CHSAA Remembers Legendary Volleyball Player and Coach Jayne Gibson-McHugh
Jayne Gibson-McHugh — one of the most remarkable athletes Colorado has ever produced and the architect of Valor Christian’s rise to volleyball prominence — passed away Saturday night after a brief, courageous fight against an aggressive form of cancer. But not before she celebrated one more state championship with her beloved Eagles.
Sidelined this season as she confronted her illness, McHugh entrusted the program to Trisha Kroll, a former assistant coach of hers and longtime high school and club coach. Thrust suddenly into the role of interim head coach for a team chasing its fourth-consecutive state title, Kroll focused on building trust and unity within the team. For seven weeks, the players and coaches rallied around McHugh’s vision, working with singular purpose to carry out the mission she had instilled in them.
“When Jayne was asked why she coached, she would tell you it was so she could teach young women to be strong and to teach them how to compete to win in sports and in life,” Kroll said. “I knew this was her vision for this team and I wanted to carry it out. I wanted to teach these girls to be strong through the adversity they were facing, and I wanted to teach them to win by choosing to play out of love and not fear.”
On Saturday night at the Denver Coliseum, as the state championship match unfolded, the broadcast played in McHugh’s hospital room. From there, she witnessed Valor Christian make history, as it became the first 5A volleyball program in Colorado history to capture four-straight state championships.
“When we went into the final set of the State Championship game, I had the team look down at the reminder they carried of Jayne on their shoe and to play for her,” Kroll added. “They found another gear in that game. Jayne would have been so proud of how strong they were and how they competed to win for her, for the Lord, and for each other.”
After the on-court celebrations wound down and the cheers from the stands faded, a few members of the team made their way to the hospital. There, they presented McHugh with the game ball — a final tribute to the coach who had shaped their program, their season, and so many of their lives.
Not long after that moment, McHugh’s fight quietly came to an end. Her legacy — one of excellence, compassion, and unwavering belief — now lives on in every athlete she coached, every memory she created, and every future athlete who will walk the path she paved.
“The impact Jayne is leaving on volleyball is profound,” Kroll stated. “In this world, our culture can teach young people to stay in their comfort zone and to avoid things that are hard. But hard is not always the same thing as bad and Jayne was really good at pushing her athletes outside of their comfort zone so they could expand their capacity of excellence and scratch at their greatest potential.
“She has empowered countless women to be strong and to recognize that if they get knocked down, to rise again.”
McHugh, formerly known as Jayne Gibson, is one of the most remarkable athletes Colorado has ever produced and is generally acclaimed to be the state’s first high school superstar following the introduction of girl’s athletics to the prep scene in the 1970s.
“She’s the most talented athlete I’ve ever worked with,” said Arvada West High School’s basketball coach, Virginia Monson, in 1978.
At Arvada West, McHugh didn’t just participate in volleyball, basketball, and track (as a high jumper and relay runner) — she excelled in all three.
Volleyball became her signature sport, and by the time she graduated, she had earned virtually every major honor the sport could offer a high school athlete. She was twice named Colorado Player of the Year, and in 1977, she was named both the Colorado Sportswoman of the Year and Steinmark Award winner.
“Jayne was a tremendous athlete… she was quick, she was strong and she was 6-feet-tall, so she had physical gifts, but she had the other qualities also,” her high school volleyball coach Mary Kvamme remembers. “She was always a positive person. She was a leader, she was respectful and she just did what needed to be done. She was the kind of kid that you loved to have on your team.
“Our [1977 volleyball] team was special, too. They were very together, they were good friends, they were good athletes, they worked hard for each other and they loved volleyball… even though they had hardly played with Title IX just being introduced. But Jayne was definitely the leader because of her qualities… she was willing to try things and was coachable. She was always willing to put herself out there to do whatever people need for her to do.”
Throughout her time as a Wildcat, McHugh won four-straight team state championships across three sports — one in track as a junior and then volleyball, basketball and track, again, as a senior.
“Now, I don’t have volumes of statistics to back me up, but I would suspect that not many schools take three state championships in as many years, let alone three in one year,” Eric Pearson wrote in his column for the Golden Transcript in March 1978. “There are many factors leading to this dominance by Arvada West of girls’ athletics this year, such as the greater experience of Jefferson County schools.
“But there is one reason above any other that explains our superiority. Her name is Jayne Gibson. Since I’m sure that anybody who has read any newspaper in Colorado lately knows about the exploits of Jayne, I won’t bore you with repetition. Suffice to say that she’s played the most important role in girls’ athletics, at least in Jefferson County, and probably in the entire state, since girls’ athletics began in Colorado.”
After high school, McHugh’s talent carried her to the University of the Pacific, where she accepted a scholarship and quickly became the heart of the Tigers’ volleyball program. As a sophomore, she earned her first All-America honor. As a junior, she led UOP to the national volleyball finals against Southern California and then virtually became an overnight collegiate basketball star for the Tigers, as new head coach Mark French persuaded her to join the basketball team, as well.
McHugh made a resounding debut, scoring 21 points to go with seven rebounds in that first basketball game. She also scored a season-high 26 points against Stanford and posted a double-double of 22 points and 13 rebounds against 19th-ranked Clemson that season.
Despite not playing competitively for two years and joining the team a month late, the 6-foot-2 center was still the team’s second-leading scorer that year.
“You don’t realize how much you miss a sport until you’ve been away from it for a while,” she told Dave Nelson of The Rocky Mountain News in February 1981 when asked about her two-year absence from basketball. “A lot of the touch hasn’t come back yet. I’ve had to work my little tail end off, but I’ve enjoyed it.
“I know I’m improving. I don’t care what stage you’re at, the more you play, the more you’re going to improve as long as you’re correcting bad habits as you go along.”
And improve, she did.
Emerging as one of the top women’s collegiate volleyball players, she earned All-America honors three times throughout her career and helped lead the Tigers to three-straight conference championships. From 1979 to 1981, Pacific did not lose a single league match, going a perfect 36-0.
As a senior, McHugh was unstoppable — a First Team AVCA All-American, the NorCal Conference MVP and an NCAA All-Tournament Team selection, she led her team in kills, hitting percentage, and in every major blocking category. To this day, she still holds the NCAA’s record for most solo blocks in a single tournament, with 15 during the 1981 tournament.
Her rise didn’t slow after college. A member of the Junior Women’s National Team during the 1979 season, McHugh joined the U.S. National Volleyball Team in 1985 and, three years later, lived out her childhood dream by representing her country on the world’s greatest stage as a member of the 1988 Olympic Team in Seoul.
Married in 1984 to Tom McHugh, he supported her chasing her dreams and kept a journal of their experience throughout the Games.
“Sharing the Olympic experience with my wife has been incredible,” he wrote in 1988. “I’m so happy for her. When I saw her on the field marching in for the closing ceremonies, I had tears in my eyes. After the ceremony, I held her and I had tears in my eyes from the emotion, the joy and the elation that she did it. She has accomplished her childhood goal of being an Olympian. I know no one else who has lived their dream.”
A middle blocker, she earned a Pan American Games bronze medal and was honored with the 1988 Player’s Award — given to the athlete who best represents USA Volleyball on and off the court.
When her playing days came to an end, she remained a player representative on the United State Volleyball Association Board of Directors and the U.S. Olympic Committee Athletes Advisory Council.
Living in Stockton, California, at the time, she eventually reunited with legendary coach John Dunning at Pacific in 1989, first as an assistant and later as associate head coach, before taking over the program herself in 2000. During her tenure, she mentored numerous All-Americans, guided the Tigers to 16 NCAA tournament appearances — including two Final Fours — and amassed a 100-59 record as head coach.
In 2019, though, McHugh felt the pull of home. She returned to Colorado with her husband, Tom – who passed in April 2025, and their two children, Ryan and Jack. Once here, she stepped into the role of head coach at Valor Christian, and her impact was immediate: the Eagles went 22-2 and finished as state runners-up in her first season.
“When she came back to Colorado, the Valor job happened to be open,” Kvamme remembers. “She got it… and my goodness, what a success! Most people at her age would have already said I’ve done enough, but she was always so enthusiastic and energetic and healthy and strong…
“I just think sometimes life isn’t fair.”
Over seven seasons, McHugh built Valor Christian into one of the state’s premier programs. She led the Eagles to the state tournament six times, the title match five times and to an extraordinary 72-match winning streak against in-state opponents. In short, she established the foundation that ultimately enabled the team to win four-straight state championships at the biggest classification — a feat unmatched since Evergreen began its run of eight-straight state titles from 1978 to 1985, coincidentally starting the same year McHugh was a freshman at Pacific.
“We’ve lost a legend,” Dave Walck said, President of the Colorado Coaches of Girls Sports. “The volleyball community aches over this loss.”
In the end, the sport honored her just as deeply as she had honored it. A two-time CHSAA Coach of the Year, McHugh earned recognition at every level, ultimately being enshrined in a long list of halls of fame — from CHSAA and the NFHS National High School Hall of Fame to the University of the Pacific, where she is honored both individually and as part of a team. She’s also a member of the West Coast Conference Hall of Honor, the Stockton (CA) Hall of Fame, the Sportswomen of Colorado Hall of Fame and the Arvada West High School Hall of Fame.
“The game is a great game,” McHugh told the West Coast Conference’s columnist John Crumpacker in advance of her 2019 induction into the WCC Hall of Honor. “I don’t know what I’d do without the game of volleyball. It’s been a part of my life since ninth grade.’’
Her legacy, carved over decades and across every level of the sport, remains a testament to excellence, resilience, and a lifelong love of volleyball. Her impact will continue to resonate far beyond the court.
